Good Governance

How to improve government openness and accountability? What kind of public administration reform should Serbia implement to ensure high quality services to its citizens and become a successful EU member state? And how should the public and civil society be engaged in these and other policies? This programme deals with issues which are the foundation and precondition for the success of all sectoral reforms in the transition and the EU integration process.

Internal Market and Competitiveness

This programme researches conditions crucial for complying with the economic criteria for Serbia’s EU membership. What are the possibilities for Serbia to strengthen the market economy and competition policy? Do the legal and institutional frameworks encourage economic activity and ensure the quality and product safety, as well as a high degree of consumer protection? These and other relevant questions are addressed through this programme.

Regional Policy, Energy and Environment

How to ensure balanced and sustainable development of Serbia in accordance with European standards? This programme emphasises topics of social development, regional competitiveness, environmental protection, energy, and transportation. In these areas we especially address stakeholder participation in planning and implementing development activities, with the goal of ensuring an informed and transparent decision-making process.

Europe&Us

This programme follows the EU accession process and already views Serbia as a member state. How do current events in the EU reflect on Serbia? How should the Serbian decision-makers react to issues such as Brexit, the migrant crisis, and the future of the EU? How to best organise representation and advocacy for Serbia’s EU membership? These are some of the questions we research within this programme.

Cross-cutting themes

We approach public policy research in a manner which takes into account relevant cross-cutting issues, such as efficiency and effectiveness, equal opportunity - gender equality, social inclusion, anti-discrimination, etc. Gradually, we’re striving to include these areas into all research activities we conduct.

Programmes

CEP's programme structure is comprised of four programmes and cross-cutting areas that we strive to incorporate into the activities of each of the programmes. A detailed description of programmes can be found in the submenu of this section.

CEP Insight

Brief analyses of current issues of relevance in the context of Serbia’s reform processes, developments in the Western Balkan region and in the EU, written in a user-friendly manner by CEP’s staff and close associates. Take 15-20 minutes of your time to get acquainted or get a new perspective on issues such as: Brexit, migration crisis, public administration reform in the Western Balkans, lobbying in the EU, and more!

CEP Briefs

One of the main communication tools in our research work, CEP brief, primarily addresses decision-makers, but also the expert public. In our briefs, we focus on providing a comprehensive but succinct state of play and existing issues, and offering policy recommendations or policy options as solutions for improving policy areas we cover. Briefs can be stand-alone policy products or be published as an addition to more extensive research publications, such as policy studies.

CEP Studies

Through all our research projects, we produce extensive and methodologically robust analyses of issues of relevance. These publications offer readers an in-depth background analysis of a wider issues of systemic nature or of sectorial character, as well as present them with relevant policy options and recommendations. Whether you’re a practitioner, decision maker, academic, or policy researcher, you will definitely find useful data or information on specific public policy issues, as well as evidence-based suggestions on how those issues can be resolved.

CEP Presents

Interested in a new EU Directive? Novelties introduced by newly adopted pieces of legislation in Serbia? Or are you interested in reviews of relevant reports or literature in the fields our work covers? CEP Presents covers these topics in in short, concise, and informative manner, offering readers an opportunity to stay up-to-date with current developments in Serbia, its neighbouring region, or the EU.

Reports and Other Editions

If you are interested in more of our writing, see other publications we published either independently or in collaboration with relevant domestic, regional, and the EU partners. In this section we also publish independent reports on Open Government Partnership progress in Serbia in cooperation with the global OGP office in Washington, D.C.

Publications

Publications focus on key public policy issues that are in the centre of CEP’s programmes and mission. With our publications, we raise awareness of targeted audience, we intend to place these issues and their potential solutions on the agenda of decision makers and to start dialogue, but also to provide expert opinion and advice. Our publications address not only decision makers, but civil society, academia, media and wider public as well.

Event announcements

In this section, we announce our upcoming events organised either independently or in collaboration with our partner organisations. Find info on the topics of events, speakers, location, and time. See you at one of our events!

Projects

Since our establishment, not only has the number of our projects increased, but they also continued to grow in scope, number of partner organisations and donors who have supported us, as well as in the influence these projects achieved. In this section, see our current projects and those we previously carried out and whose results we continue to strengthen.

Partnerships

Since our establishment, we have created a wide network of partnerships in the country, the region, and at the European level. Our partners include local civil society organisations, international organisations, government institutions, and many others. Each year we strive to widen our network of partners and increase the number of our mutual projects and activities.

CEP Blog

CEP Blog is a platform for our staff, associates and Council members to contribute concise and informative opinion pieces on topics relevant to Serbia’s EU integration process, regional or domestic developments. These posts might also be published in newspapers, magazines, or other media outlets we collaborate with, and they represent opinions of individual authors. Are you interested in what’s happening in Serbia, in the Western Balkan region, or the EU? Check out our latest blog posts!

Team

CEP team is consisted of highly qualified and renowned experts in the fields of European Law, Public Administration, Political Science, International Relations, and other areas of social sciences and humanities. Robust social capital in the form of seasoned management and expert associates, along with promising junior team members, all contribute to CEP evolving as an organisation capable not just of conducting research, but also achieving a tangible impact in the decision-making sphere.

CEP Council

The Council members include distinguished national and international experts, high-level representatives of the renowned national institutions, academia and international and multi-lateral organisations. Council will be entrusted with an advisory and steering role in shaping the CEP strategic and program framework and providing recommendations for its further development. Simultaneously, the Council should contribute to the further advancement of research methodologies and capacities in the individual programme areas of CEP, as well as support the wider outreach of CEP’s research results among key stakeholders and the public in general.

About CEP

European Policy Centre is a non-governmental, non-profit, independent think-tank, founded in 2011 by a group of professionals in the area of EU law, EU affairs, economics and public administration reform, with a shared vision of changing the policy making environment in Serbia for the better – by rendering it more evidence based, more open and inclusive and more substantially EU accession driven.

State of the Union 2016: No mention of enlargement, but…

All quiet on the Western Front: the State of the Union address by the EC President Jean-Claude Juncker before the members of the European Parliament (MEPs) was, in accordance with all expectations, dominated by the topics of security, economic growth, European values, Investment Plan, crumbling solidarity. “Never before have I seen such little common ground between our Member States. So few areas where they agree to work together.“ State of the Union is in fact a speech delivered by the head of the European Commission once a year, on the occasion of the first EP plenary session in Strasbourg, where he/she focuses on the current issues in the EU and announces the planned initiatives for the upcoming year. This speech, at the same time, serves the purpose of demonstrating the EU’s power and its responsibility as a global actor. It is equally supposed to bring impetus into the EU’s functioning. Bearing in mind the problems the EU is facing nowadays, perhaps the expectations regarding this speech were too high. Policy community interested in our region was disappointed that Juncker has not paid a single word on enlargement policy and the Western Balkans.

Unfortunately, this is not the worst thing that we could deduct from this speech. The announcement of the legislative proposal for the passenger control mechanism for the Schengen visa-except third-country nationals (among which are the Serbian citizens and the UK nationals in case of Brexit, for example) is a much greater reason for concern. European Travel Information and Authorisation System (ETIAS) would have for its objective to determine the eligibility of all visa-exempt third country nationals to travel to the Schengen Area, and whether such travel poses a “security or migration risk.” According to this initiative, each passenger would be obliged to fill in the application form with the questions related to the person’s identity, the duration and the purpose of travel, etc. The data would be stored in a centralised database, based on which the positive or negative decision on the entry of the passenger in the Schengen zone would be made. The concrete legislative proposal for the introduction of this mechanism is scheduled for November this year.

Such initiative, which to a large extent resembles the USA’s ESTA system, is somewhat justified in the context of allegedly comprehensive containment of the security threats. What remains to be seen, however, is whether the EU will charge the fee for filling in this application and under what would be the amount of the fee. The French outlet of the Euractiv media portal reported that, according to the reliable unofficial sources, this amount would go from 10 to 50 euros. In practice, this would mean that every Serbian citizen needs to pay a fee for entering a Schengen country each time before his/her visit.

Such a scenario would have immense practical and political implications for the Western Balkan region. The citizens would travel less due to the newly imposed levy, whereas politically, such decision would signal even further and longer European perspective of the region. The legislative proposal due in November will show whether these allegations are false or not. After that, through streamlined advocacy and concrete proposals for amendments to the draft regulation (with the help of the MEPs who strongly endorse Western Balkans countries’ EU membership), we can influence the decision making and prevent the described worst-case scenario.